Sunday 16 August 2009 17.09 EDT
First published on Sunday 16 August 2009 17.09 EDT

Rafael Benítez made passing reference to a meeting which he had attended "the other day" to address the thorny issue of referees, their decisions and how managers ought to react to them in the prickly heat of the moment. "They said we cannot speak about the referee as a person [or] about their decisions," said Benítez, the Liverpool manager, as he sweated in an airless post-match press conference suite at White Hart Lane.

What the Spaniard said next came without a shrug of his shoulders but it roughly equated to "What the hell". The new season might be a matter of days old but the task of gagging managers in the face of perceived injustices appears to be as thankless as ever. In the case of the contentious moments here, the emphasis ought to be on the word 'perceived'.

Having already been awarded a stonewall penalty, for a foul by the Tottenham goalkeeper, Heurelho Gomes, on Glen Johnson – which was converted by Steven Gerrard – Benítez watched as his substitute Andriy Voronin was levered off the ball inside the penalty area on 86 minutes by Benoît Assou-Ekotto.

Arms outstretched, Benítez reacted incredulously when the referee Phil Dowd kept his hands behind his back. His mood, and that of the Liverpool coaching staff, was not improved moments later when Fernando Torres cannoned a shot against Assou-Ekotto, and Dowd ignored the appeal for handball.

"I think everyone could see there was a penalty, especially to Voronin, it was so clear," said Benítez. "The third one, you could excuse. You can say that the hand was to the ball or the ball was to the hand, it could be, but the other one was so clear, it was unbelievable. Can you get two penalties at an away ground? No. With this referee, I knew that this was impossible."

Benítez was asked what he thought of the referee's overall performance. He remained tight-lipped but theatrically took off his spectacles and held them up for inspection. The non-award for the Assou-Ekotto handball shout brought the red mist down on Sammy Lee, the Liverpool assistant manager. He directed a volley of abuse at the fourth official Stuart Attwell, who is a relative rookie at the age of 26, and, at one point, Benítez had to step in to separate the pair. Lee could not remain quiet and, after continued protests, he was sent to the stands. The sight of him stomping angrily off down the tunnel summed up Liverpool's frustrations.

"The fourth official is a young referee and maybe he needs to calm down a bit," said Benítez. "He is too young. Sammy will be banned from the touchline but the only thing with Sammy is that he cannot score goals for us. So hopefully Torres will do his job."

This was an isolated moment of humour. There was little for Benítez to smile about and, in truth, his moans about the officials not only did him no credit but it obscured the consensus that Liverpool deserved nothing from the game.

Benítez, who saw Jamie Carragher receive stitches in a head wound and Martin Skrtel depart with stitches and a damaged jaw after a first-half collision between the pair, did acknowledge that his team "did not play well, especially in the first-half" and that they had not been "comfortable in possession". "We need to improve in the middle, keeping the ball," he added. "The understanding between the strikers and the midfielders has to be much better."

Victory against Stoke City at Anfield on Wednesday night, he said, was now imperative but Benítez denied that Xabi Alonso's absence was a factor in the disjointed performance; the playmaker has left to join Real Madrid. Harry Redknapp, however, was not so sure.

"They are going to miss him," said the Tottenham manager. "He is a quality player. I felt today that Liverpool didn't get the ball into Gerrard playing in that hole off Torres. It would have been hard to press Liverpool like we did if Alonso had been in the team because he is so clever and he can turn the ball around corners with just one touch."

If Liverpool have to improve, Tottenham need to build upon an excellent result, which featured a host of fine individual performances, from Assou-Ekotto and the debutant Sébastien Bassong, who headed the winning goal, to Luka Modric and Wilson Palacios.

"Palacios gives us something different," said Redknapp. "He is that Graham Roberts type of player that Tottenham haven't had for years. We have changed the team around in terms of characters and we look a much better group of players."